A shutout victory with no further injuries is exactly what the doctor ordered as the South Delta Sun Devils get set to embark on their demanding conference schedule.
The Sun Devils closed out their pre-season schedule by cruising to a 35-0 victory over the Mission Roadrunners on Saturday in Tsawwassen. The game took only about 90 minutes to be played as the running clock rule was implemented in the second half once South Delta led by more than 29 points.
Head coach Ray Moon didn’t mind one bit. A couple of wild games south of the border had taken its toll and there are much bigger challenges on the horizon.
“We had a lot of guys stepping up today and playing out of position,” said Moon, noting a patched up offensive line that was missing three starters. “We should be getting two of them back and we will need them.”
The eight-team Western Conference looks competitive from top to bottom, even for the No. 3 ranked school in the province.
The Carson Graham Eagles come to Tsawwassen on Saturday on the heels of a 61-21 victory over Handsworth in their annual rivalry game. The North Vancouver school also defeated Mouat 49-25 two weeks earlier.
Even a trip to Belmont the following week can’t be taken lightly before the Devils jump into the teeth of their conference schedule with games against Vancouver College, Mt. Doug and Notre Dame.
Seaquam and New West are also huge rival games with the Delta Cup and Kushnir Boot trophies on the line but Moon doesn’t want his team looking past week one.
“Carson is a pretty good football team and we are expecting a good hard fight,” he continued. “Mission came at us hard and we knew they could run the football. They had trouble throwing the ball and we actually have a pretty good pass defence just from what we see in practice every day.”
The shutout performance was a relief to Moon after watching his team surrender 119 points in two games, including a week earlier.
Quarterback Michael Calvert went 18-for-23 for 202-yards while firing a pair of touchdown passes to Cailean Ouellette and another to Jacob Kirk.
Running back Andrew Kraft made the most of his three carries with 58-yards and a pair of majors.
